PROJECT MANAGEMENT | Sam Goldman

I did a wide array of both self-directed and collaborative projects on staff at UC Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism. I primarily assisted the student services and advancement teams.

WRITER AND EDITOR

CURRICULUM AUDIT

I wrote and edited all manner of internal and external-facing content and communications with the School's brand and voice in mind. Most notably, I wrote or copy edited stories for the School's website about School ongoings, alumni, and students' successes.

I also wrote and edited:

the student services website (I'd link, but it's J-School folks only!)
materials sent or presented in the dean's name
materials in preparation for our advisory board meetings
social media posts before they go live

Some samples:

"Meet Berkeley Journalism's 7 Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program Alumni" (the story that received the most engagement in 2020)
"Portrait of an Alum: Terry McMillan" (retweeted by the author to her 250K followers)
Social media: Twitter
Social media: Facebook

I audited the program's entire curriculum to not only see whether courses' unit counts, materials fees, and course numbers were appropriate, but to layout a blueprint for how to align these three curriculum components with campus policies.

To do this, I:

Mastered Berkeley's curriculum and fee policies and systems
Interviewed other programs about their curriculum processes
Interviewed and queried J-School instructors and surveyed current and past students
Guided by campus policy, I crunched the numbers to recommend unit counts, materials fees, and course numbers based, respectively, on real student workload, current materials needs, and media-platform groupings
Broke down proposed changes by media platform, instructor type, and magnitude of changes
Presented my findings to J-School leadership with a timeline and guide for implementation

Here's a PDF of my 140-page final report. (Any type of remotely sensitive material has been left out; reproduced with permission.)

CAREER FAIR

I handled the nuts-and-bolts logistics of putting on UC Berkeley National Association of Black Journalists chapter's first annual career fair — the School's largest-ever fair — which brought some two dozen media recruiters and hundreds of students and young, local journalists.

To do this, I:

Kept in constant contact with invited media outlets and accommodated last-minute additions
Invited young journalists from around the Bay Area and handled much of the local promotion
Internal and external point person leading up to and during the event for all logistical needs
Handled catering, registration, parking, liability/insurance documentation, and signage
Spent nine hours setting up, ensuring things run smoothly, and taking down the event
Delegated tasks to others

Here's a PDF of my handbook for how to put on another successful fair. (Any type of potentially sensitive material has been left out; reproduced with permission.)

FACULTY WEBINARS

I organized and moderated a series of webinars for prospective students in which I interviewed faculty about studying in their respective tracks and taking viewers' questions.

To do this, I:

Reached out to instructors and scheduled their webinars
Reviewed professors' backgrounds, the media tracks they lead, and prepped my questions accordingly
Interviewed professors, kept the webinars on schedule, and fielded questions from each webinar's dozens of viewers
Video recordings of each — Investigative, Audio, New Media, and Narrative Writing — are available on YouTube

Here's a PDF of my handbook for how to put on another successful series. (Any type of potentially sensitive material has been left out; reproduced with permission.)

$50,000 LECTURE AND RECEPTION

One of the most important journalists of the 21st century gave the J-School's biggest lecture of the year following a VIP reception with our donors and the Bay Area's top journalists.

Found and invited those journalists
Handled all catering needs and oversaw registration
Oversaw spending parts of our $50,000 budget
Adjust our lecturer's hotel accommodations
Draw up and execute call sheet and delegate tasks to two student assistants
Spent 12 hours setting up the reception, ensuring it ran smoothly, and taking it all down
Did everything bearing in mind our donors were attending

ANTI-RACISM: Helped lead a working group addressing systemic anti-Black and other forms of racism within the J-School. Guided by student action items, worked with faculty, staff, and alums to produce short- and long-term structural reforms related to extracurricular and public-facing activities. Turned all recommendations, feedback, and original action items into a framework and report for the dean's final anti-racism plan.

CAREER SERVICES REVAMP:

Mastered Airtable in order to better track and maintain students' career-planning needs and milestones and taught School staff how to use it
Consolidated Career Services' most important information and databases in one place
Counseled students on their résumés, cover letters, and portfolios and connected them to alumni mentors
Compiled a database of Bay Area news outlets, their genres, contacts, and alums who worked with them

REMOTE LEARNING: Collaborated with Student Services and technical staff to transition curriculum to online, including mastering bCourses, Zoom, and Kaltura; coordinating resources for instructors; and facilitating instructors' technological and pedagogical preparation.

ADMISSIONS SUPPORT: Assisted the Director of Admissions in screening applicants, researching other J-programs' admissions criteria, and interviewing applicants, and worked with the Admissions Committee to finalize admission offers. Learned the SLATE system.

SOCIAL MEDIA: When needed, I took charge of our social media channels, keeping abreast of School, faculty, student, and alumni ongoings and successes, which I turned into posts (see above for samples). I kept the School's brand in mind and voice in mind.

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT: Brought in two professional-development organizations from the wider campus to supplement our Student Services Department and counsel students on things like work–life balance and financial wellness.

SURVEY ANALYSIS: Used Qualtrics and Datawrapper to review and analyze the results of past School social-climate surveys to understand changes in student demographics and the sources of students' negative experiences. This is a blueprint for more targeted efforts to build a more supportive and inclusive climate.

I did a wide array of both self-directed and collaborative projects on staff at UC Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism. I primarily assisted the student services and advancement teams.

WRITER AND EDITOR

CURRICULUM AUDIT

I wrote and edited all manner of internal and external-facing content and communications with the School's brand and voice in mind. Most notably, I wrote or copy edited stories for the School's website about School ongoings, alumni, and students' successes.

​

I also wrote and edited:

the student services website (I'd link, but it's J-School folks only!)

materials sent or presented in the dean's name

materials in preparation for our advisory board meetings

social media posts before they go live

Some samples:

"Meet Berkeley Journalism's 7 Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program Alumni" (the story that received the most engagement in 2020)

"Portrait of an Alum: Terry McMillan" (retweeted by the author to her 250K followers)

Social media: Twitter

Social media: Facebook

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

I audited the program's entire curriculum to not only see whether courses' unit counts, materials fees, and course numbers were appropriate, but to layout a blueprint for how to align these three curriculum components with campus policies.

​

To do this, I:

Mastered Berkeley's curriculum and fee policies and systems

Interviewed other programs about their curriculum processes

Interviewed and queried J-School instructors and surveyed current and past students

Guided by campus policy, I crunched the numbers to recommend unit counts, materials fees, and course numbers based, respectively, on real student workload, current materials needs, and media-platform groupings

Broke down proposed changes by media platform, instructor type, and magnitude of changes

Presented my findings to J-School leadership with a timeline and guide for implementation

CAREER FAIR

I handled the nuts-and-bolts logistics of putting on UC Berkeley National Association of Black Journalists chapter's first annual career fair — the School's largest-ever fair — which brought some two dozen media recruiters and hundreds of students and young, local journalists.​

​

To do this, I:

Kept in constant contact with invited media outlets and accommodated last-minute additions

Invited young journalists from around the Bay Area and handled much of the local promotion

Internal and external point person leading up to and during the event for all logistical needs

Handled catering, registration, parking, liability/insurance documentation, and signage

Spent nine hours setting up, ensuring things run smoothly, and taking down the event

Delegated tasks to others

FACULTY WEBINARS

I organized and moderated a series of webinars for prospective students in which I interviewed faculty about studying in their respective tracks and taking viewers' questions.

​

To do this, I:

Reached out to instructors and scheduled their webinars

Reviewed professors' backgrounds, the media tracks they lead, and prepped my questions accordingly

Interviewed professors, kept the webinars on schedule, and fielded questions from each webinar's dozens of viewers

Video recordings of each — Investigative, Audio, New Media, and Narrative Writing — are available on YouTube

$50,000 LECTURE AND RECEPTION

One of the most important journalists of the 21st century gave the J-School's biggest lecture of the year following a VIP reception with our donors and the Bay Area's top journalists.

​

Found and invited those journalists

Handled all catering needs and oversaw registration

Oversaw spending parts of our $50,000 budget

Adjust our lecturer's hotel accommodations

Draw up and execute call sheet and delegate tasks to two student assistants

Spent 12 hours setting up the reception, ensuring it ran smoothly, and taking it all down

Did everything bearing in mind our donors were attending

​

CAREER SERVICES REVAMP:

Mastered Airtable in order to better track and maintain students' career-planning needs and milestones and taught School staff how to use it

Consolidated Career Services' most important information and databases in one place

Counseled students on their résumés, cover letters, and portfolios and connected them to alumni mentors

Compiled a database of Bay Area news outlets, their genres, contacts, and alums who worked with them

​

REMOTE LEARNING: Collaborated with Student Services and technical staff to transition curriculum to online, including mastering bCourses, Zoom, and Kaltura; coordinating resources for instructors; and facilitating instructors' technological and pedagogical preparation.

​

ADMISSIONS SUPPORT: Assisted the Director of Admissions in screening applicants, researching other J-programs' admissions criteria, and interviewing applicants, and worked with the Admissions Committee to finalize admission offers.​ Learned the SLATE system.

​

SOCIAL MEDIA: When needed, I took charge of our social media channels, keeping abreast of School, faculty, student, and alumni ongoings and successes, which I turned into posts (see above for samples). I kept the School's brand in mind and voice in mind.

​

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT: Brought in two professional-development organizations from the wider campus to supplement our Student Services Department and counsel students on things like work–life balance and financial wellness.

​

I handled the nuts-and-bolts logistics of putting on UC Berkeley National Association of Black Journalists chapter's first annual career fair — the School's largest-ever fair — which brought some two dozen media recruiters and hundreds of students and young, local journalists.

ADMISSIONS SUPPORT: Assisted the Director of Admissions in screening applicants, researching other J-programs' admissions criteria, and interviewing applicants, and worked with the Admissions Committee to finalize admission offers. Learned the SLATE system.